Dist. 16, Part 2, Art. 1, Q. 2
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/4/d/16/q/bon-sent-IV-d16-p2-a1-q2
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### Question II. *Whether one who is an adult, approaching baptism with an actual sin, must first receive the Sacrament of penance.*

Secondly it is asked whether one who is an adult, approaching baptism with an actual [sin], must receive the Sacrament of penance before baptism. And that it must be so, it seems.

1. In *Acts*, chapter two: *Repent, and let each one of you be baptized;* the Gloss: « About to speak of baptism, he set before it the laments of penance, that they might first be drenched with the water of affliction and afterward be washed in the Sacrament of baptism ».

2. Likewise, in *Matthew*, chapter three: *They went out to him* etc.; the Gloss: « Even then an example was given to those to be baptized, of confessing their sins and promising better things »: therefore if they must confess, likewise also they must have contrition and make satisfaction.

3. Likewise, it seems *by reason*: because the Lord and the blessed John began their preaching from penance; but they ought to have begun from that which is the beginning of salvation: therefore if they so began, it is plain that one must first receive penance.

4. Likewise, the person first corrupted the nature; but the actual [sin] is a corruption of the person, and the original of the nature, and against the actual is penance: therefore it goes before baptism.

5. Likewise, the little child has only the original [sin], but the adult the actual together with the original; but he who has the greater illness ought to have the greater remedy: since therefore baptism is necessary for the little child, something beyond baptism will be necessary for the adult. But this is nothing other than penance: therefore etc.

**On the contrary:**
1. Baptism is the gate of the Sacraments; but the gate is first, and before it nothing ought to be set: therefore etc.

2. Likewise, « penance is the second plank after shipwreck », as Jerome says, and it is held in the text above, in the fourteenth distinction; but it is called second in respect of baptism: therefore this does not precede it.

3. Likewise, baptism wipes away every fault, as was shown above — whence Augustine to Valerius: *By the washing of regeneration all the sins of men are cleansed and healed* — but it is superfluous to do through many what can be done through one: therefore for cleansing penance is not necessary.

> **Conclusion.** Penance, insofar as it is a virtue and contrition, ought in adults to precede baptism, but not insofar as it is a Sacrament and absolution and satisfaction; confession, however, may fittingly be set before.

**I respond:** It must be said that one may speak of penance as it is a virtue and as it is a Sacrament. If we speak of penance as it is a virtue, whose act is contrition; it is necessary that it precede baptism in the adult who has actual sin; « for no one can begin a new life unless he repents of his old life ». — But if we speak of penance as it is a Sacrament, according to which a man confesses and receives absolution; I say that it is not necessary that it precede, but it may fittingly do so. For

confession is made to a priest, that a man may blush and recognize his sins and not be ungrateful to God for their remission, and as to this it is fitting; but neither ought absolution nor binding to follow, because [the sin] is wholly loosed in baptism. — Therefore penance as to *contrition* precedes necessarily; as to *confession* fittingly; as to *absolution* and *satisfaction* in neither way. And because the Sacrament is completed in absolution, since there is the remedy; therefore I say that penance, according as it is the Sacrament of the Church, follows, it does not precede.

**To the solution of the opposing arguments:**
*To 1 and 2.* To that, then, which is objected first, that the laments of penance ought to precede; it must be said that this is to be granted; likewise, that the example was given of confessing, not because it was necessary, but because it was fitting.

*To 3.* To that which is objected, that preaching began from penance; it must be said that it began from penance-as-virtue, not as Sacrament.

*To 4.* To that which is objected, that the corruption of the person is prior; it must be said that this is true in the first parents, but afterward it was the reverse; and because the Sacraments run according to the course of our necessity; therefore it is plain that baptism had to be first.

*To 5.* To that which is objected, that he ought to have the greater remedy; it must be said that this is true, namely contrition; but it is not necessary that [he have] another Sacrament, because baptism avails for both; and therefore another Sacrament is not required, but the act of the mind suffices, by which one prepares oneself for the effect of baptism, otherwise he would approach feignedly. And so that is plain.

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